The path the Goddess has put before Cassandra is to advocate for families with special needs children. As Cassandra embraced this path, she has found that all families have special needs and we are all the children of the God and Goddess. Cassandra has found that often to find what works for a family, one must parent outside of the lines.

The Holiday Season… such mixed emotions. I absolutely love seeing family and catching up with those I see only about once a year. They are exhausting though. I know I struggle to get grounded again and my children certainly do. Getting a break from school, bed times that change, lots of people, lots of places and then suddenly …. we expect them to get back into the grove in just a day or two.

Children struggle at school, more phone calls from school saying your child is having issues. You are trying to organize yourself and get yourself back into the groove, which frustrates you even more when you have to stop what you are doing to deal with your child. This is a good time to step back and realize that your child maybe struggling to shift into this more scheduled life. It is hard to switch gears, especially for some of our children. They don’t “hate” school or rules, they just struggle to change their mindset.

Things that can make it easier if they are having problems readjusting, relax the rules a little bit at home, Give slowly get up to speed with each of the rules. Talk to your child about how they are feeling. Open communication is key. Sit down at their level and really ask them how they feel. Let them see you are listening. This lets them know they care cared about and they can talk to you about how they feel and not be afraid that you will be “mad”.

This leads me to one of the most important parenting issues. Communication. It is important to always communicate with your child. If they seem to be experiencing anxiety or frustration, talking to them and asking about it or helping them find words, will go a long way into helping them learn to regulate themselves or to ask for help. As they learn they can open up to you and you will not be “mad” at them, it will allow honest communication and support. If you can show your children that you can ask for help from other people too so they learn that while you are a Super Parent – even Super Parents with Super Powers need help and support from others when things get to be too much.

So take a deep breath – the holiday season is over, and ground yourself and help your children ground themselves whatever way that works for them.

The path the Goddess has put before Cassandra is to advocate for families with special needs children. As Cassandra embraced this path, she has found that all families have special needs and we are all the children of the God and Goddess. Cassandra has found that often to find what works for a family, one must parent outside of the lines.

The Wheel of the year has completed another turn. It is time to look back and learn what worked, what thrived, and what was not what we intended. This is a good time to look at our parenting and our lives – with honesty.

Each year our children get older and we must change our parenting style as they mature because they need different things. We will never stop being their parents but our relationships with our children will change. This is the time of year that I take a really hard and honest look at changes I need to make to my parenting and relationship with my children. I also look at how this past year my parenting and relationships might have already changed.

Both of my children are now adults. Each still has their own special needs but both are now having to learn to handle their special needs.

One of the most important things I learned when parenting my children is to put them in charge of certain special needs. The world will not always cater to their needs and they need to be able to advocate for themselves or know how to work around things.

My son has a serious milk ALLERGY (not intolerance) he can die if he has a small amount of milk product. I started him early in his life showing him how to order and look at ingredients, to not have anything he does not know is safe for him. He has learned how to bake and cook and understands alternatives that can work for him. He learned unique things like scrambled eggs in most restaurants are made with a batter that contains milk so if he wants scrambled eggs, he specifies out of the shell. I did not baby him or force everyone to cater to his food issues. Now as an adult he goes out with friends, takes trips (even to foreign countries) and is able to order for himself and keep himself safe.

Teaching natural consequences and letting kids fail is an important part of the learning process. Start the school year with giving your kids freedom to make mistakes (not get all of their homework done, play video games or txt on their phone) – let them know if they cannot prioritize their fun then you will do it for them. If they fail and their grades start going down or they miss assignments, remove the thing that is causing the distraction. Once they get back to where they need to be, give them a good week or two and then give the distraction back.

This year was a tough year for me and required me to really change the way I parent each of my children and each required a completely different approach. My daughter is now 18 and has made some very poor choices and despite my best efforts she has no plans on changing. I love my daughter unconditionally but I have had to limit my contact so I do not enable her behavior. She has a way to contact me if she wants to online, but I found that any other contact at this time is detrimental to her and I. What she NEEDS from me at this time in her life is to know I love her and I will always be there to listen to and love her. Someday, I hope when she starts making better choices or wants to, she will know she can ask for my advice and support, until then all I can do is love her.

My son on the other hand has matured more than I ever thought possible. A driver’s license is in the near future and he is becoming very responsible. I am trying to learn to not ask about homework and to let him continue to learn by making his own decisions and choices. He does ask my advice and I try to give it to him in a way that helps him see as many sides as I can think of so HE can make a choice and learn the process of thinking things through.

As a self acknowledged “control freak”, these changes have been very hard for me. I want the best for my children. I love them and don’t want to see them suffer. But I know they must deal with the challenges and obstacles that are in their path. The most important thing is for me to show them unconditional love and support so they know they always have someone they can talk to when they need it.

Let your parenting mistakes and choices that did not work, be the fertilizer of better parenting – we grow from what we learn.

The path the Goddess has put before Cassandra is to advocate for families with special needs children. As Cassandra embraced this path, she has found that all families have special needs and we are all the children of the God and Goddess. Cassandra has found that often to find what works for a family, one must parent outside of the lines.

Day and Night have become equal for a moment, and we see the wheel of the year start moving to the darkness. In our family this year, the turning of the wheel of year towards the dark, coincided with Grandpa moving on from this world and into the next with the circle of life. While my children are grown, I know that death was often a hard topic. Whether a beloved pet, a friend or a family member, discussing death was always tough. I found that simple is the best. It is also important that the parents are agreed on a faith that they want to express to their children. Even if the parents do not have the same beliefs, it is important to come to a consensus before explaining death and any afterlife to the children so they are not confused or think that one parent was not telling the truth.

It is important to use “We believe” or “I believe” in describing death and any after life, because you want your child to learn and investigate their own beliefs. While I had explained to my children that I believed that when a living creature dies they become part of the energy around us and at some point will be reborn as something else. Different members in our family have different beliefs but all seem to believe that there is something after death and we do feel that after they leave this world they will have peace in the next.

Helping children see the circle of life, – birth – growth – death will help them understand how it is a part of life and not something to fear and instead focusing on life. Grandpa had an amazing life. He loved, laughed, cried, cared, taught and protected. He was a musician and an Alcatraz prison guard. He was a grandfather who raised his grandson with an open heart and mind. It is his life that should be celebrated, not his death to be mourned.

This is the perfect time to see death and dying as you take a walk. So many as many plants die and become part of the soil, we can celebrate their last burst of colorful beauty until they are reborn as part of something new. Here in California we have been having a terrible drought so seeing these colorful leaves and plants, you can see the beauty that survived a challenging year. Think of the clean air they provided to us and the pollen for the bees, the shade for many animals and the beauty in this world. Life is meant to be lived and celebrated as it happens and to remember that nothing last forever so appreciate it while it is here. When it is gone, know that it will be around us and come back in a new way.

I will miss Grandpa, but most of all I will appreciate the wonderful man he nurtured his grandson, my husband into. Grandpa will live on through my husband and then through my son and his children, related by blood or not – love and experiences do live on through those we love.

The path the Goddess has put before Cassandra is to advocate for families with special needs children. As Cassandra embraced this path, she has found that all families have special needs and we are all the children of the God and Goddess. Cassandra has found that often to find what works for a family, one must parent outside of the lines.

We are almost through summer and I am sure many of you are counting the days until school starts again. Many of our special children are struggling with the change in their schedules and anxious about the new school year, which will mean new classmates, new teachers and new surroundings.

This leads to very tired parents who are trying to figure out how to make it through the last few weeks of summer. If it is too hot outside (and you are in drought conditions) you may find doing cool things in the kitchen may create some fun times.

Frozen bananas, strawberries can be cool and fun to eat. Frozen juice ice cubes can be nice to put into water or juices. You can mix the juices or use them in the same juice. You can also put this juice ice-cubes in Sprite or 7-up.

Kids can help make these things and enjoy being part of the mixing and matching. It is cold and interactive and it teaches patience as they see it takes time for them to freeze.

Making Jell-o and adding fruit and such can be fun too.

I used to love making ice-cream the old fashioned way – in a hand crank ice-cream maker. I even have recipes for soy ice-cream – one is listed at the end of this column. The kids decided what they wanted in it and we would make it. It showed patience and how things would start to pay of with effort and hard work. This is a good lesson for this time of year as we look to seeing the fruits of our labor come in through the harvest – letting our kids see in a short version that it feels good to work and get rewarded.

In this world of instant gratification, we can help our children learn patience and to enjoy the rewards of effort put in by letting them work side by side with us or even just supervising them so they are able to feel how wonderful accomplishment can feel. The feelings and rewards of true accomplishment help raise self-esteem. Imagine how happy your children would be as everyone eats their ice-cream that evening for dessert or raves about how good the punch or juice or Jell-o is.

Soy Ice-cream for ice-cream maker recipe:

2 cups plain, unsweetened soymilk

3/4 cup honey

1/4 cup maple syrup

dash of salt

1 1/2 tsp vanilla

2 cups of whipping soy-cream

1st make the whipping soy-cream by placing 1 & 1/3 cups soymilk and 2/3 cup light cooking oil in a blender and blend on high for at least 30 seconds. Put in fridge to chill while you do the rest.

Scald the soymilk in pot – until just before boiling stage, stir in the honey , maple syrup and salt then stir in the vanilla and whipping soy-cream. Chill in fridge for 30 min.

Add any fruit or flavoring you wish and then follow the directions for your ice-cream maker to freeze it.

This is not quick but I found it was a good way to spend the day with my kids and enjoy the fruits of our labor.

The path the Goddess has put before Cassandra is to advocate for families with special needs children. As Cassandra embraced this path, she has found that all families have special needs and we are all the children of the God and Goddess. Cassandra has found that often to find what works for a family, one must parent outside of the lines.

Litha, summer solstice, the longest day of the year is when you really see your intentions manifesting. It never fails that I am struck by how the Goddess has decided to have my intentions manifest. Often about now I do not understand why my intentions manifested the way they did, but I know there is a reason.

One thing I have learned is this is the time of year I often grieve. I grieve for how I dreamed my intentions would manifest so I can accept and work with what I really have. If you do not grieve for the loss of a dream, you struggle to accept the differences between the dream and reality. This struggle often leads to frustration and negative emotions. It is only through the process of grieving (it may be a quick and simple process or it may be much more intense and prolonged) that we are able to let go of the dream and see the reality for what it truly is. Often what we find is the reality of our manifested intention is better in the long run than the dream we had of it.

Looking back at the last column about letting go of negative relationships or putting boundaries on them, I find this column follows smoothly on the tails of that one. When we end anything, even something negative, there is a loss. Often we feel some relief but there is a loss even a physiological one. When we are stressed or dealing with drama, certain chemicals such as adrenaline course through our body and brain. These are chemicals that can also give you a “high” feeling or a lot of energy. Often when we remove ourselves from those type of situations, we are no longer at a “heightened” sensory state and feel almost like we do not feel or do not feel as intensely. We actually feel a loss or emptiness not having that drama or negativity around.

This is what makes grieving important. Acknowledge the feelings of loss and allow yourself to accept there are going to be some things you miss, even if it is the flood of these chemicals in our body. This allows you to make safer and more thoughtful decisions on how you want to fill that void. If you do not allow yourself to grieve, often you will find yourself subconsciously filling that void with similar types interactions. This becomes self-destructive.

This is especially important when you are raising special needs children and you are on the go all of the time from one stressful situation to another. It is easy for a parent in these circumstances to not allow support or help because they become “addicted” to living in this high stress way. Instead find a way to put more positives in your life and take away a little of the stress, and then allow yourself to grieve the strange feeling of loss and emptiness that you feel so you can enjoy the reality of a moment of calm.

When trying to explain this to people who are struggling to understand how we feel a loss at negative things being removed from our lives, I often tell this story of what happened to me.

When I was about 16 years old, I had major knee surgery. Within a few weeks after the knee surgery I started feeling this nerve pain that felt like a hot, sharp lightening bolt from the toes in my right foot to the top of my neck – it would sometimes throb but most often it just kept like a stabbing pulse and never stopped. I tried pain killers, hypnotherapy and every kind of pain management I could find. Nothing cured it and I just learned to adjust the best I could. My gait changed a bit to compensate and part of my brain was always working at blocking the pain.

Oddly enough 20 years later, my husband was giving me a massage after I had done a long drive and he pressed hard and we both heard a crunch and I sure felt something painful crunch. I could still move my fingers and toes and could move – and I was still in a lot of pain and I went to bed. In the morning, I awoke and honestly thought I had died. I was trying to figure out why I felt so odd and I realized I didn’t have that pain. I cautiously got up and walked around. I bent and twisted and even jumped up and down. I was so happy, even if it was going to be a short time – I was thrilled to be rid of the pain for a bit. I went to work, and at work I suddenly started having issues, I was having a hard time walking up and down stairs, I tripped a bit. I kept feeling off. By the time I got home I realized, I had was struggling with my walking because I was used to dealing with a sharp pain that was no longer there so I was now walking differently, I felt off because part of my brain was no longer blocking pain and didn’t have anything to do.

Within a few days when I decided the pain was really gone for good, I actually did a ritual and let go of my hold on the pain. For 20 years this pain had been part of me and my life. Something I interacted with nearly every moment of every day – even if it was negative, it was a part of my life and I had to say good bye to it so I could embrace my new life without the pain. When I did, walking became easier and I was able to feel more comfortable in my own mind.

Most importantly though is allow yourself to feel and acknowledge your feelings. Do not put yourself down and say, feeling this is dumb, or silly. Acknowledging loss or any feelings you have at all is important to your own mental, physical and spiritual life and most importantly knowing yourself.

The path the Goddess has put before Cassandra is to advocate for families with special needs children. As Cassandra embraced this path, she has found that all families have special needs and we are all the children of the God and Goddess. Cassandra has found that often to find what works for a family, one must parent outside of the lines.

In my last column, I discussed taking care of yourself by taking time to re-charge. In the past few weeks, a theme seems to be running through my friends, clients and my own life of learning also how to care for yourself and your family by letting go of things that are negatively influencing your life……

That paragraph is where I stopped while trying to write the Beltane column. I only wish I would have taken my first paragraph and had applied it appropriately through the next 2 months. So I am going to continue to write the Beltane column now from the past and then catch up with my Litha column and hopefully can follow my own advice and keep myself on track.

So as I was previously discussing, we often need to take care of ourselves and our families by letting go of things that are negatively influencing your life. So often we feel like we already have a vested interest in time and energy, that we keep hoping that the next bit of energy or time we put in, we will finally start to see a pay off. This is plain and simple gambling. And if you know much about gambling the house always ends up getting the better end of the deal and the one gambling ends up losing unless they know when to stop.

That is the problem, knowing when to draw the line in the sand, when enough is enough. Because after all your heart keeps saying, if not you, who else will do this? Maybe just a little bit more time and this person or this thing will not be so negative and I will reap the rewards of my efforts. So I suggest to you, to take a look at the real costs with any endeavor.

First your time and energy – do not UNDER VALUE it! So often we under value the worth of our time and energy. So I want you to look at it this way. If this negative situation (person, relationship, company, volunteer job – whatever) costs you energy and time, you have less to give the important and positive people in your life. So think about dealing with 2 hours of drama between “friends” and those 2 hours you could be spending creating wonderful memories with your children or a date night with your spouse. See the value of your time and energy – it gives great benefits to others which means your time and energy does have a high value. Now also look at how much energy and time those 2 negative hours dealing with drama takes away from you – you are upset and for a couple of hours you do not have the energy to play and have fun with your children because of your bad mood. After the kids have gone to bed, you go over the frustrations with your spouse. You may have lost another 2-4 hours on top of the 2 hours of drama – this could amount to 6 hours of your time gone – wasted on negative energy.

So now is a good time, to start realizing where and how you spend your time and energy. Look at what seems negative in your life and decide to draw that line in the sand. Stand by your boundary and make a choice to spend your limited time and energy in a more positive way. Distance yourself from negative people or situations. Don’t engage when they try to engage you.

If a friend calls to complain about a relationship that you have tried and tried to help them see how to handle things with less drama and they still aren’t doing anything, tell them nicely, “I think that is better worked out between you and the other person without me in the middle.”

If you are not able to cut ties completely, limit the time you deal with the negativity. “Sure we can work on the project tomorrow, but I can only be there for 2 hours so we have to put our noses to the grindstone.” and then hold to that.

When we choose to limit our negative interactions we have more positive energy and time for those who really do need it in our families.

(And for you special needs parents dealing with family members that don’t understand your children’s special needs – do what you know you need to do and distance yourself from those who do not support you – you deserve positive support!)

The path the Goddess has put before Cassandra is to advocate for families with special needs children. As Cassandra embraced this path, she has found that all families have special needs and we are all the children of the God and Goddess. Cassandra has found that often to find what works for a family, one must parent outside of the lines.

Spring – the time of creation of rebirth – when the world is born again and everything starts growing and the world seems to burst forth with new energy and life. At times, I have actually felt jealous of Mother Earth, because she sure seems to have a lot of new energy at this time of year. She seems rejuvenated and awake and ready to create, while I feel run down from the winter months, sick children, muddy floors and carpets, driving through winter weather to so many appointments, I just do not feel all of this extra energy to create and follow through with my seeds of intent.

All I can think about is the weeds that are taller than me, yard work, more appointments and as usual our hectic schedule. I cannot imagine finding time to create and work and have energy for my seeds of intent.

What I have found though after years of struggling, is you can get the energy and creativity from Mother Earth herself. She gives it freely to those who can connect with her. It is important to take some time to connect with her, to connect with nature, letting go of all of the things that pull us away and instead embracing our closeness with Mother Earth, with nature. We then can be reborn, rejuvenated, and re-energized.

How do you do this? You need to take time for you. This could be with your partner\spouse or it could be alone. And before you file this with, I don’t have time or am not able to – think for a moment – if you are struggling to find energy, how efficient are you? How can you be the best parent to your children if you are too tired to handle the constant challenges to the best of your ability? Think of this as gassing up your car. If you don’t stop to put gas in it, eventually you will be stuck and have to either call for help or have a huge effort and time loss because you have to push it. So taking 10 minutes to fill up your tank is a benefit. So, think of how much you ask yourself to do. Is a couple of days in nature really too much to ask for probably another 6 months to a year of energy?

Now find a way to get away, get someone to watch the kids, arrange for grandparents to help, have them spend the night at a friend’s house, have a friend or family member stay with your children – find a way and get away.

For me, Coastal Redwoods and the ocean are where I really reconnect with nature. What is it for you. Go there. Go to a B&B or camp, what ever works for you (for me a B&B was wonderful as someone else was cooking and my mornings started out nicely – ready for my adventure of the day).

The Coastal Redwood to the left is the Mother of the Forest at Big Basin Redwoods California State Park. She is most likely over 1000 years old and possibly closer to 2000 years old. I love sitting next to her and feeling her energy. I feel such wisdom and peace when I am near her. This is one of the ways I recharge.

She was in a fire and much of the fire destroyed her insides, but she is healing and she steadfastly watches all around her. She like us, must just continue to work, grow and live while she heals.

Take this time to heal and re-energize your self so you can be the best you can be.

Creation takes energy and if you do not have it, you cannot create, you cannot help your seeds of intent grow. Most importantly you cannot create the bonds you need to with your children.

This waterfall has a decent flow of water. It is beautiful. But I have seen it when it had more water flowing through it and it was majestic and seemed so powerful. But we have been having a drought, most likely by mid summer it will be a trickle or all dried up. It was still be a beautiful place, but it will lack some of the beauty the water brings to it. If we allow our energy to become a trickle because of a drought of taking care of ourselves, we will lose some of the beauty that emanates from us when we are full of energy and creation.

There is an ebb and flow of the world and our energy. High tides and low tides, but it is up to us to make sure we protect those we love by taking care of ourselves – allowing time for re-energizing, and reconnecting with what gives us that energy.

by Priestess CassandraThe path the Goddess has put before Cassandra is to advocate for families with special needs children. As Cassandra embraced this path, she has found that all families have special needs and we are all the children of the God and Goddess. Cassandra has found that often to find what works for a family, one must parent outside of the lines.

So much of this country has been in such a cold spell, meanwhile where I am we have been warm and begging for rain. I am in Northern California and where I am we are now banned from doing almost any watering and we are having to cut down a lot on the amount of water we use.

This made me think of how often we have personal droughts. It can be financial drought, or emotional drought, or a relationship or friendship drought. I can honestly say that I have struggled with being in a friendship and relationship drought. With two special needs children, I have struggled to maintain or have friendships and even my family relationships are sometimes strained. When I was taking my children to meetings, appointments, and having to constantly deal with melt downs, I just did not have enough time and energy to deal with the friends who thought my parenting was wrong or find new friends.

I often felt like I had not one drop of support. I struggled watching my children try to make friends, knowing that I was not really modeling the “how to be a good friend and make friends” thing. I mostly communicated with my friends on the Internet.

I found going to support groups with parents raising children like mine was helpful and I would go to an annual conference each year and flood myself with support and friendships – but like a rainstorm after it passed by – the puddles of support would progressively dry up and I would again feel parched and desperate for friendship. I often felt when I felt that way, there was no hope of finding friends that the drought was permanent. It was at these times that I SHOULD have gone to a support group meeting to at least feel a mist or sprinkles again. Sadly, I would tell myself, my children came first and I couldn’t take the time to go to a support group, there was too much else to do.

It has taken me years to learn how to get through a drought. I now know, I need to focus on the friendships I do have (conserving water), go to support group meetings and seek out others with similar issues (gather every drop you can from each rain storm) and not let those friendships and opportunities go to waste (after collecting the water, treasure it and not to be wasteful).

And since I am one of those people who tends to care for others more than I do myself, I reminded myself – that when I go to a support group or nourish a friendship – it is not just what I get out of it, but the other person or people gets something out of it too. They may also be struggling and need someone who understands.

Remember while we may have drought conditions of something in our life, it is how we handle the drought that determines whether we get through it or whether we become dry, brittle and crumble.

The path the Goddess has put before Cassandra is to advocate for families with special needs children. As Cassandra embraced this path, she has found that all families have special needs and we are all the children of the God and Goddess. Cassandra has found that often to find what works for a family, one must parent outside of the lines.

Another holiday season has come and gone. As usual, the holiday season brought interesting revelations and drama with at least one of my children. During the winter months we often look within ourselves. The problem with that when dealing with our children and other family members is often times we use our personal thoughts, feelings, abilities, dreams, goals, failures, challenges and beliefs as filters to how we perceive them.

For example, I pretty much paid for college on my own – working my way through college and I always wished that I had parents who could have paid for college so I could have focused more on schooling and not have been so sidetracked on making money. I have just recently put myself through college again and now that my children are college age – I want them to have better opportunities than I did. So my son starts college this past fall and he struggles with his classes. I had told him – no job, no car, just focus on school – and if he gets good grades we will pay for everything for him. I got frustrated. He ended up with a job. He failed one class and got low grades in another because he just didn’t stay on top of his assignments. He got sidetracked with work and friends. Using my past and knowing what I know, I kept getting really upset with him for not taking school seriously. *I* was the one who was upset about his grades.

I sat down and talked with him – listening to what he really had to say, trying desperately to not let myself look at him through my tainted lens. He said he learned he cannot put things off. He things he knows what he wants to do for a career now because of the job and will take more classes that relates to it (the one class he aced related to it). He also pointed out that his best friend will be leaving at the end of January and he will not see him for 2 years. He has had a life of some heartbreak and frustration. He looked at me and reminded me that friendships are important and what if something happened that they never saw each other again after his friend left – he said he would regret not spending time with him (hmm I constantly told my kids that friendship and family was very important – I guess he listened to me there).

I learned something about myself through that interaction – that I need to let my son be who he is and deal with his challenges that will make him who he is. That made me realize it was the same for most of my family. I cannot make them be who I wish they were – I need to accept them for who they are. I need to look at how they have grown through their challenges and be proud of them for who they are and what they are trying to do.

This is really important if you have a child with special needs or who marches to the beat of a different drum. We need to be the place they can talk things out and not feel judged. We need to let them learn what works for them and what their lives are going to be. We can give advice but sometimes they need to face challenges on their own. Failure is not really failure – it is an opportunity to learn and grow – if we take that away from them but trying to protect them, we are limiting their abilities to succeed in life.

Think of the mistakes and “failures” you have had and then think how each of them was a chance for you to learn and grow. You wouldn’t be the person you are now without those mistakes and “failures” because each was an opportunity to better yourself.

I struggled to figure out what to write for this column and was beating myself up for not doing it sooner or on time – but in the process I learned a lot and important things that I could write about. Do I like being late on a column – No – but sometimes there is a reason even if we don’t know it yet.

The path the Goddess has put before Cassandra is to advocate for families with special needs children. As Cassandra embraced this path, she has found that all families have special needs and we are all the children of the God and Goddess. Cassandra has found that often to find what works for a family, one must parent outside of the lines.

The Wheel of the year has completed another turn. It is time to look back and learn what worked, what thrived, and what was not what we intended. This is a good time to look at our parenting and our lives – with honesty.

The challenge is not to see failures or problems as negatives but to see them as learning experiences. One of the first places to start is the holidays of last year. Parents so often want to give their children the best. The biggest and the most amazing holiday season with the grandest of experience, yet so often something happens and we are saddened and frustrated that it did not happen the way we planned it out.

For many children the holiday season is just TOO MUCH! Too many visits, too many times off schedule, too many gifts, too many faces, too many noises, too many expectations and too many feelings and emotions from everyone around. Too many children are over stimulated and do not have enough quiet or scheduled time. So if your last holiday season was a struggle from dealing with your kids being out of sorts, change it up this year.

Take a look at when problems may have occurred last year. Now this next part requires real thinking outside the lines; what can you change that you feel would help the situation? Some families do progressive meals where each course is served at a different location. For some children, this is too much moving around. Consider only going to one part so as to create less upheaval for your children.

Consider creating new family traditions that are calmer. Have children make crafts for presents and learn to give time and thought. Maybe each choose a family member name and only give a present to that person – that way less presents if that overwhelms a child.

Other ideas – the 12 days of Christmas – spread out the presents over several days or 12 days or whatever to help your child not become overwhelmed. Be willing to stand up to your family and let them know you want your kids to have a good season and there might have to be changes. In the end you and your children will be happier and isn’t spending a good time with your children the most important thing?

Maybe this time of year is not a problem for your family – are there any times or occasions that are problematic. Take a look at what may have caused problems or issues and start looking for new ways of handling things. Use what HAS worked in the past and use it to help things that have not worked in the past.

This is the perfect time of year to harvest what was useful and worked to use for future events and to let go and learn from those that are not useful – similar to letting the spoiled vegetables and the vines turn into mulch to help grow the next crop.

It is a new year, time to let go of what did not work and use what did. Free of guilt and fear and chastising – for life is a learning experience and we can learn from EVERYTHING we do.